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English478A: Comedy and Cruelty, Shakespeare's dark comedy crosses…

- - - - "The wise man trembles when he has laughed; the wise man is afraid to laugh"
      - "Human laughter is intimately connected with the accident of an ancient fall, of a physical and moral degradation [...] As no sorrow afflicted him, man's countenance was simple and composed, and the laughter that nowadays shakes nations did not distort the features of his face"
      - "Laughter, so they say, comes from superiority [...] Laughter comes from a man's idea of his own superiority"
      - "a symptom of weakness in laughter [...] a nervous convulsion, an involuntary spasm [...] That misfortune is almost always a weakness in mind [...] deplorable phenomenon than weakness delighting at weakness [...] The misfortune is sometimes of a very inferior kind [...] we shall find at the very heart of the laughter a certain unconscious pride"
    - - "And thus it happens that each soul conceals, Showing the opposite, now gay, now sad, The passion that it genuinely feels" - Petrarch
      - "For although most of our actions are indeed only mask and make-up and it may sometimes be true that an heir's tears are a laugh behind the mask" - Publilius Syrus
      - "our soul is often agitated by diverse passions [...] though various impulses stir it, there must be one that remains master of the field"
      - "When I call him a clown or a calf, I do not undertake to sew those labels on him forever; nor do I think I contradict myself when I presently call him a fine fellow [...] No quality embraces us purely and universally"
      - "our soul looks on the thing with a different eye, and represents it to itself in another aspect, for each thing has many angles and many lights [...] we are wrong to try to compose a continuous body out of all this succession of feeling [...] One part of his duty is performed; let us allow him to perform the other"
  - - - "Now ignorance is a bad thing, as is the condition we call boorishness. It's from these premises that you can discern what nature the ridiculous has [...] it is a sort of wickedness [...] 'do not know yourself at all'
      - "All instances of those who 'do not know themselves' must necessarily be in one of these three categories [...] first, as regards money - imagining themselves richer [...] there are even more who imagine themselves to be taller and better looking [...] yet much the larger number are mistaken about the third type of things - i.e., those of the soul, since they imagine themselves better in virtue, when in fact they are not"
      - "do we not find the majority of them fiercely making a claim, full of contention and false knowledge, about the virtue of wisdom [...] this view of childishness of malice into a view of a the strange mixture of pleasure and pain"
      - "Then you must divide them by this criterion: those whose ignorance is accompanied by weakness and the inability to retaliate if laughed at, then you would correctly call 'ridiculous'; whereas you will give the truest account of those who are powerful and bale to retaliate if you call them 'frightening' and 'hostile' [...] ignorance by the powerful, both itself and it's imitations is naturally classed as something ridiculous"
      - "potential for malice"
      - "this disposition on the part of our friends, if it is not harmful to others, is ridiculous [...] the argument, then, amounts to this: when we laugh at the ridiculous behavior of our friends, mixing pleasure with malice, we are mixing pleasure with pain"
    - - "Judgement is a tool to use on all subjects [...] Sometimes in vain and nonexistent subject I try to see if it will find the wherewithal to give it body, prop it up, and support it. Sometimes I lead it to noble and well worn subject in which it has nothing original to discover"
      - "What I say of this example may be said of all others: each particle, each occupation, of a man betrays him and reveals him just as well as any other"
      - "I prefer the first humor, not because it is pleasanter to laugh than to weep, but because it is more disdainful, and condemns us more than the other, and it seems to me that we can never be despised as much as we deserve. Pity and commiseration are mingled with the same esteem for the thing we pity; the things we laugh at we consider worthless [...] I do not think there is as much unhappiness in us as vanity, nor as much malice in stupidity. We are not so full of evil as of inanity; we are not as wretched as we are worthless"
      - "Our own peculiar condition is that we are as fit to be laughed at as able to laugh"
  - - - "comedy is an imitation of more buffoonish people - not characterized by complete evil because in face what is base can sometimes be ridiculous, since the ridiculous consists of baseness which causes no pain and is not destructive"
      - "Comedy is the imitation of an action which is funny without magnitude, complete, with each of the parts separate in its form, by an actor and not by narrative"
- - - - "From the spirit-evocative, grandiosely illustrious, manifoldly celebrated academy which one vociferates as Lutetia" (147)
      - "'We transmigrate the Seineian flow, both matutinally and nocturnally [...] we inculcate out virile members into the most interiorally located recesses of the pudenda..." (148)
      - "'My lord, it seems clear that this gallant gentleman wants to imitate the language of Paris, but all he's doing is butchering Latin" (149)
    - - "Which Pantagruel cheerfully agreed to, and they put it [wine] away so efficiently [...] And then Pantagruel had a sudden, urgent need to piss, and he pissed all over their camp [...] his private and personal flood drowned everyone for ten miles around" (218)
      - "Pretty soon, they [Dispodes] had put away so much wine that they were snoring like hogs, sleeping wherever they happened to fall down, all over the entire camp" (216-217)
    - - "'In classical Greek: 'Dear Master, why, why don't you give me some bread? You see me virtually dying of hunger, and you have no pity for me, none at all, and ask me improper questions. Yet all those who love learning agree that words are superfluous when the facts are obvious to everyone. Words are necessary only when the things we discuss don't clearly reveal themselves'" (163)
      - "'By my faith, it's only fortune that's made him poor, because I swear that nature made him in some rich and noble mold, and the bad luck that often befalls people with curious minds has reduced him to such beggary'" (160)
    - - "And then I realized that, when Pantagruel yawned, pigeons with fully extended wings flew right down his throat, thinking it was a great bird house" (231)
      - "'Indeed,' he said. 'But where did you shit?' 'In your throat, sir,' I said. 'Ha, ha, but you're a fine fellow!'" (232)
- - - - [Maria] "Observe him [Malvolio], for the love of mockery, for I know this letter will make a contemplative idiot of him" (2.5.15-19)
      - [Maria] "He [Malvolio] will come to her in yellow stocking, and 'tis a color she abhors, and cross-garters, a fashion she detests; and he will smile upon her, which will now be so unsuitable to her disposition, being addicted to a melancholy as she is, that it cannot but turn him into a notable contempt" (2.5.202-208)
      - [Toby] "Come, we'll have him in a dark room and bound. My niece is already in the belief that he's mad. We may carry it thus, for our pleasure and his penance, till our very pastime, tired out of breath, prompt us to have mercy on him, at which time we will bring the device to the bar and crown thee for a finder of madmen" (3.4.144-150)
      - [Malvolio] "I am not mad, Sir Topas. I say to you this house is dark.
        [Fool] Madman, thou errest. I say there is no darkness but ignorance, in which thou art more puzzled than the Egyptians in their fog.
        [M] And I say there was never a man thus abused. I am no more mad than you are" (4.2.42-46, 48-50)
      - [Fool] "I will help you to 't. But tell me true, are you not mad indeed, or do you but counterfeit?
        [Malvolio] Believe me, I am not. I tell thee true.
        [F] Nay, I'll ne'er believe a madman till I see his brains" (4.2.119-123)
      - [Fool] "'Better a witty Fool than a foolish wit'" (1.5.34)
      - [Malvolio] "Sweet lady, ho, ho!
        [Olivia] Smil'st thou? I sent for thee upon a sad occasion.
        [M] Sad, lady? I could be sad. This does make some obstruction in the blood, this cross-gartering, but what of that? If it please the eye of one, it is with me as the very true sonnet is: 'Please one, and please all'
        [O] Why, dost thou, man? What is the matter with thee?
        [...]
        [Maria] Why appear you with this ridiculous boldness before my lady?
        [...]
        [O] Why, this is very midsummer madness!" (3.4.19-27, 40, 61)
    - - [Shylock] "I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge! The villainy you teach me I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction" (3.1.57-72)
      - [Shylock] "Signior Antonio, many a time and oft in the Rialto you have rated me About my moneys and my usances. Still have I borne it with a patient shrug (For suff'rance is the badge of all our tribe). You call me misbeliever, cutthroat dog, And spet upon my Jewish gaberdine, And all of ruse of that which is mine own. Well then, it now appears you need my help. Go to, then. You come to me an you say 'Shylock, we would have moneys'--you say so, You, that did void your rheum upon my beard, And foot me as you spur a stranger cur Over your threshold. Moneys is your suit. What should I say to you? Should I not say 'Hath a dog money? Is it possible A cur can lend three thousand ducats?' Or shall I bend low, and in bondman's key, With bated breath and whisp'ring humbleness, Say this: 'Fair sir, you spet on me on on Wednesday last; You spurned me such a day; another time You called me 'dog'; and for these courtesies I'll lend you thus much money'?" (1.2.116-139)
- - - - “‘Do you think so?’ replied he. ‘I cannot agree with you. It appears to me a most perfect resemblance in every feature. I never saw such a likeness in my life. We must allow for the effect of shade, you know.’ ‘You have made her too tall, Emma,’ said Mr. Knightley. Emma knew that she had, but would not own it; and Mr. Elton warmly added, ‘Oh no! certainly not too tall; not in the least too tall. Consider, she is sitting down—which naturally presents a different—which in short gives exactly the idea—and the proportions must be preserved, you know. Proportions, fore-shortening.—Oh no! it gives one exactly the idea of such a height as Miss Smith’s. Exactly so indeed!’” (46)
      - "She would have given a great deal, or endured a great deal, to have had the Martins in a higher rank of life. They were so deserving, that a little higher should have been enough" (176)
      - "he was gone off to London, merely to have his hair cut [...] an air of foppery and nonsense" (192)
      - “was not much deceived as to her own skill either as an artist or a musician, but she was not unwilling to have others deceived, or sorry to know her reputation for accomplishment often higher than it deserved” (43)
      - “‘Oh! very well,’ exclaimed Miss Bates, ‘then I need not be uneasy. ‘Three things very dull indeed.’ That will just do for me, you know. I shall be sure to say three dull things as soon as ever I open my mouth, shan’t I? (looking round with the most good-humoured dependence on every body’s assent)—Do not you all think I shall?’
        Emma could not resist.
        ‘Ah! ma’am, but there may be a difficulty. Pardon me—but you will be limited as to number—only three at once.’
        Miss Bates, deceived by the mock ceremony of her manner, did not immediately catch her meaning; but, when it burst on her, it could not anger, though a slight blush shewed that it could pain her.
        ‘Ah!—well—to be sure. Yes, I see what she means, (turning to Mr. Knightley,) and I will try to hold my tongue. I must make myself very disagreeable, or she would not have said such a thing to an old friend’” (347)
    - - "You mean to tell me that you argued your way from a C+ to an A-?"
      - "Excuse me, Miss Dion."
      - "What's seven times seven?" "Stuff she knows."
      - RSVP scene
      - "You think that's all I do, I'm just a ditz with a credit card?"
      - "Emma" and "Clueless" both revolve around love plots; in a way, these two narratives could also be seen as comedies of manners given both Emma and Cher manipulate social lines